Three Solstices
by sivvussa
Summary: Weiryn and Numair refused to speak to each other. They were adamant that the other person was the very lowest excuse for a loathsome male in the entire world – more, in all the Realms. And for years, every time the Realms drew together and gods crossed paths with mortal children, things got more than a little... awkward. D/N Short Ficlet (3 Chapters) with added Fluff and Drama!
1. The First Solstice

Weiryn and Numair refused to speak to each other.

It made planning for the solstice very awkward. It upset Sarra, and it made Daine absolutely livid. But there it was. They were adamant that the other person was the very lowest excuse for a male in the entire world – more, in the realms complete – and there was nothing the women could do to persuade them otherwise.

It had all come to a head at harvest the year before. Not that anyone would dare to speak about it, but of course they all dwelled on it in their own ways.

The festival had been wonderful for many reasons, not least being that it was the first Gods-Day since the Immortals war had ended. The shadows of war and famine and disease had faded away, and the world was beginning to right itself again. The fields, although admittedly fed by rather grisly means, had flourished. The harvest was bountiful and the grain houses filled to bursting.

Daine could hardly sit still for long enough to eat her breakfast, because it was also the first day when her parents would be able to cross the realms since she had found out who they really were. She had even chosen her clothes with far more care than she normally bothered with: a dress, because Sarra would make some comment if she wore one of her usual tunics, but made of practical fabric because her da and the People would doubtless find some way to ruin silks. It was green, which she liked, and the embroidery on the bodice brought out the excited shine in her eyes, which Numair liked. It was already crumpled from taking the brunt of her nervous energy.

"They won't be here until this evening, love!" The man laughed, eventually moving closer on the bench they shared in the dining hall and looping his arm around her waist to hold her still. Daine blushed, because she still wasn't used to Numair's easy affectionate gestures when they were in public. She felt like people were staring already, since she was wearing such unusual clothes!

"I know, but I've not seen them in weeks and weeks, and there's so much that I want to talk to ma about, and..."

"... and if you don't calm down and eat something, you'll be far too worn out to walk all the way into the forest, much less talk!" He finished a little sternly, and Daine rolled her eyes.

"If I'm worn out I'm fair sure it's your fault..." she started, looking pointedly at his hand on her hip. He grinned and passed her a piece of toast.

"All the more reason for you to eat."

"Honestly." She muttered, and spread some honey on the warm toast. "Da's going to have a field day with you."

"We seemed to tolerate each other," he shrugged and helped himself to another piece of bacon. Daine winced.

"You do know he showed you all those naked women in the temptation lake on purpose, right? And I'm fairly sure he thinks it's your fault I lost that bow he made me, and he's pretty grouchy at the _best_ of times, and for all I know he actually thinks like a stag, since he's got those horns... have you ever spoken to a stag, Numair?"

"Not that I recall."

"Well, they're a bit possessive of the females, especially around other stags... stop smirking, love."

"I wasn't aware I was doing it." He looked aloof and utterly failed. "It's not every day I get compared to a stag, you know. Especially not by a girl in such a pretty dress. Will I be a stallion next, sweetling?"

"Why, do you need reassuring?" Daine retorted tartly, and he laughed and kissed her neck. The girl squeaked and shoved him off.

"Ugh, you're impossible!" She smiled despite herself and shrugged. "Well, don't blame me if he's not the friendliest person tonight. I tried to warn you. If you don't make friends you can blame yourself for flirting with me when I was trying to be serious."

"I'm flirting seriously. You really do look beautiful. Besides, I'm supposed to flirt today. It's a solstice."

"...and we're meeting my parents. My _parents,_ Numair."

"...which is why I'll wait, and flirt with you afterwards."

"How very noble of you." She kissed his cheek playfully, forgetting her shyness of the other people in the room, and then looked him right in the eye. "Actually, no. You're being bad, and I won't put up with it."

"Very bad. I'm getting it out of my system before we leave for the forest. And since I know how long it takes to lace that dress up, magelet, I'll thank you not to goad me into being worse."

She laughed, and then a hesitant look crept into her eyes. "But you will be good tonight?"

"Of course," he smiled gently and kissed her forehead. "I promise. It's important to me, too."

They set off early that afternoon. Because they hadn't confided in their friends yet about where exactly they had been for the few months when they had disappeared, they tolerated far more wolf whistles and suggestive comments than they really deserved (or at least, that's what Numair complained to Daine – she cut her eyes up at him and didn't have to say anything to make him pull a face back). Whatever their friends thought they might get up to in the Royal Forest was an utter mystery, because the woods were still thick with Immortals, and they both armed themselves before stepping outside of Corus' curtain wall.

Sarra had sent a message through the Badger, who had grumpily shoved at Daine through her blanket until she woke up a few nights before. The creature didn't seem at all surprised to be waking up two mortals rather than one, although he did make a few tetchy remarks about being cast aside, and having to spend his night in the mortal realms sleeping in the cold.

"But at least it means I won't wake up covered in mud and earthworms," Daine replied tartly, passing the note to Numair who rubbed his eyes sleepily. The Badger growled under his breath, and breathed out onto his paws. They shimmered for a moment, and then looked so clean it was as if they had been groomed.

"Fine, get in." Daine said, hiding a yawn and settling back down again. She lifted up the edge of the blanket for the animal to wriggle beside her. "I'm too tired to argue."

-What about him?- The Badger asked, and by the snide note in his voice Daine realised that this whole thing had been some weird Badger-y test. She shrugged and shifted over a little.

"You're not the first, Badger, just the noisiest. Stay on that side of me and he won't mind too much. What does it say, Numair?"

"There's a druid circle ten miles south of the Karim Noss way-bridge, in a straight line." He folded the note up and lay down. "I guess that's where they can cross over."

And three days later they set off at noon and found it by late afternoon. It wasn't easy: the ancient stone circle had been overgrown for so many years that even the stone paths which had once led to it were nothing but white dust on the black soil. Still, with half a day to travel and the warm autumn light to see by, it was a far less arduous trek than they were used to.

The clearing was almost eerie, almost beautiful. The ancient stones jutted out from the blue-green grass like teeth, reaching up among the brown trunks and the golden leaves towards the sky. It felt strange, and after a moment they both realised that it was because no birds were singing, and no animals were foraging. They tensed, hands on weapons as they looked around for a hostile immortal.

There was a hollow thud of sound, and two bright lights suddenly solidified in the middle of the circle.

"Ma!" Daine cried, and darted across the clearing to throw her arms around the green silhouette's shoulders. Numair hesitated, and bowed as deeply as he could to the god, and then the goddess.

"Oh, don't worry about all that," Sarra said brightly, and the green glow faded. "It's just us, and you're almost family, after all."

There was a loud snort. Apparently, Weiryn disagreed. Daine blinked at him and then went over to her father's side, kissing his cheek and speaking in a low voice.

Sarra turned to Numair and her voice was a rapid whisper, "Between you and me, I hope she can calm him down. He's really been looking forward to seeing her but the hunt went badly today, and he's still raring for the kill." She sighed, as put-upon as any fed up housewife, and added, "He really is impossible when he's in this mood."

Numair looked up, but Daine and her father were so focused on each other it was clear that neither of them were needed. "She's been so excited, you have no idea."

Sarra smiled, and it was such a warm expression that the man felt instantly put at ease. "Oh, I think I do. When she was a little girl she was such a terror, getting so wound up before every festival I feared she would burst...! How are you, Numair?"

"Very well. It's good to see you, Sarra. When the war ended, we were praying for both of you... even though we're not quite sure how it works, you know, since you're gods already..."

The goddess grinned and shushed him, resting tapering fingers on his elbow. "I know, it was very good of you. Think of it as getting a nice message from the courier, only... only nothing like that, now I think on it. Oh dear." She frowned and straightened up. "I'm fair sure my idiot husband has scented blood."

"What?" Numair looked around, and saw that the man who was looming over Daine looked absolutely forbidding. His gravelly voice was strident in the clearing, and the laughing tones of their affectionate reunion were instantly banished.

"What do you _mean,_ you haven't told him?" The god demanded of his daughter. The girl folded her arms stubbornly and glared back, all five feet of her beside his nine feet of height.

"I didn't see any cause for telling it." She replied. "And I don't know why you're so set against..."

"But it means that your idiot mortal has no idea who you really are!" Weiryn roared, and Daine took a step back with a nervous glance at her mother.

"This again." Sarra muttered, and rested her hand on Numair's shoulder. "I told you: fresh blood. Whatever happens, don't..."

"I know who I am!" The girl declared, and raised her chin proudly in the air. "And so does Numair – far better than you do, I reckon!"

Weiryn snorted, more like a deer than a man, and leaned closer. Raising one elongated finger, he touched the point of Daine's chin and, meeting her furious glare without flinching, let a single spark of magic flow between them. She shivered, and for a moment nothing happened. Then an odd silvery sheen seemed to flicker across her, and she rubbed at her eyes as if they stung. When she drew her hands away from her face she looked different.

Her skin was more luminious – not glowing, but filled with the first flush of life that newborn infants shine with. Her eyes, too, were brighter and more awake, as if her father had infused her with pure energy. Her hair looked the same, but two gently curving nubs of horn emerged from above her ears and then rose above her forehead like a crown.

"What did you do?" She hissed at her father, feeling at her skin as if it would wipe off. Weiryn drew his hand away, looking at her steadily.

"You are my child, and a daughter of the gods. Are you _ashamed_ of who you are, that you'll keep it secret?"

"No!" She planted her hands on her hips. Her voice was more musical than normal, as if she were speaking in a resonant chamber of the palace, but the irritated gesture was entirely Daine's own. "But since we're talkin' secrets, I wonder why I'm not yelling at _you,_ da, for hiding away for all of my life!"

"Oh, please. It was barely two decades." The god snorted again, but this time it was more like derisive laughter. Numair stepped forward then, because even though Sarra tried to pull him back, that arrogant laugh made white anger pool in his veins.

"If you care who Daine really is, then you might want to start by understanding why she's upset, not witching her." He snapped. Weiryn scowled at him and Numair continued, "You left her alone on that mountain to fend for herself, and I know eighteen years is nothing to you, but to a mortal it's a lifetime."

"If she's upset because she's mortal that's your fault, not mine." The god sneered, and Sarra rushed over to hush him. He shook the goddess off, meeting the mage's confusion with ease. "Daine, tell this human your secret. Tell him what he stole from you. Tell him what he _knows_ better than your father _."_

"Weiryn, no...!"

"Da," Daine took a deep breath, and looked at her flawless palms. "Please take this foolish magic off me. I don't want this. Maybe, if you..."

"Tell him." The god's voice dripped with power, and Daine trembled. Her voice was defiant, but the words were ripped out of her, and they clearly hurt.

"I chose to be mortal." Then, with more fire she turned on her father again: "I didn't choose to be your... your doll, to dress up like a goddess, da."

"You chose...?" Numair asked, and the girl winced. Weiryn looked a little triumphant, a little ashamed, and entirely pained when a furious Sarra planted her heel firmly into his shin.

"I chose you instead." Daine met his eyes for a moment, tearful, and then looked at her mother. Tears started flowing down her cheeks, and she spoke as if her voice were stitched cruelly to her soul. "I didn't want to tell him, mama. Please make da stop it. Make him _stop."_

That was too much for Numair. His temper finally snapped, and when Weiryn made no movement towards his pleading daughter the man launched himself at the god and punched him squarely in the jaw. Weiryn staggered back, absolutely stunned for a moment, and then he snarled in feral outrage and hurled himself back.

"Daine!" Sarra wrapped her arms around the girl's shoulders and drew her away, both of them staring with wide eyes at the two who were fighting like creatures, not men, striking blindly at each other in a passion of hatred and fury. Daine gasped and struggled free of her mother's clutches, hurling herself into the fray as Sarra shrieked behind her. It was hard to see, to breathe, to move or think, but then Daine found an opening and hurled herself at Numair, sending him barrelling back into the dust.

"Stop it!" She sobbed, pressing down on his arms with all of her slight weight. He gasped for air and tried to sit up, and the girl shoved him back again. "Stop it, Numair! You can't hit him! You can't!"

"I don't care if he is a damn god, Daine, he's an absolute...!"

"He's my _da!"_ She yelled, and shook her head in absolute hysteria, repeating the same words over and over again. "You can't hit my da, Numair, you just can't!"

"Get off me." He pushed her away, struggling to his feet and holding himself upright against one of the standing stones with breathless fury still livid in his voice. Even as he was struggling to get his bearings, Daine rounded on the other man and shoved at him, both hands outstretched to pound against his chest.

"And you! You don't _ever_ do that again!" She spat, and shoved at him again. "You're not my god, you're my da! Neither of us chose that! If you do anything like that to either of us ever again, I swear I'll tell all my friends that my precious father is really a chaos demon, because you're acting like one right now!"

Sarra gasped in a shocked rush of air at that, because there was no doubt that Daine was making an absolute promise, and it was the worst threat she could have made against the god who towered over her. He growled, livid at her words, and the horns on his head grew sharp, threatening tips. Daine lowered her head, but it wasn't in respect. Even as her father changed shape she matched him, growing long canines and snarling jaws.

They faced each other down, two hunters deathly afraid of their prey, and for a breathless moment even the wind didn't dare to move. Then, with a suddenness that made Sarra and Numair flinch, Weiryn began to laugh. It was a hollow sound, more angry than amused, but it broke the tension and made his daughter slowly shift back into a human shape.

"That trick doesn't come from chaos, _daughter_." Weiryn sneered, and disappeared in a snap of light.

Daine gasped and dropped to the ground, falling as if there had been strings holding her up. When Numair ran over to her she flinched, and then caught his arm and held it so tightly he couldn't bend the elbow at all.

"I'm sorry," Sarra said, coming over to them slowly. "He... he doesn't mean to be cruel. He just can't help hunting, you see."

"Will you be alright, ma?" Daine whispered, letting Numair help her to her feet. Her mother nodded, and kissed her on the forehead.

"I'll be fine, love. He's had his solstice fight, now. He'll be in a much better mood by the time I get home, and I wouldn't want him skulking around my mothers in that state anyway." She shrugged, and then touched the side of Numair's face where a livid bruise was just beginning to show. Silvery light bloomed, and the bruise sank away.

"Weiryn's will take longer to heal." She confided, and grinned. Numair smiled back, shakily, but his heart clearly wasn't in it, and Daine hardly reacted at all. Sarra sighed and nodded as if all her fears had come true. "I'll talk to him, loves."


	2. The Second Solstice: Part 1

The Second Solstice Part 1

It was purely by chance that Daine found herself near a crossing point that solstice, and she nearly wept when she spotted the odd jagged stones among the rocky hills. The Scanran foothills seemed desolate enough to be godless, but she knew that wasn't true. She was looking at this country through eyes that were jaded, and tired, and sick of the sight of more and more land that she longed to be miles away from.

The stones were almost hidden in an outcrop of slate, and Daine holstered her bow cautiously before clambering across towards them. The slate was stacked at erratic angles, and some of the edges were hewn to razor sharp points by the wind and the rain. Two years had passed since they had been led to the first druid circle, and the girl was growing more and more convinced that these crossing points hadn't been made by human hands. She couldn't imagine who, in their right mind, would spend time and effort hauling heavy rocks to such a dire, wind-howling valley and then dragging them through this narrow slit of slate.

Actually, that was a lie. She could imagine one person who would do it, but she wouldn't let herself dwell on that. If she started remembering Numair's odd, quirky projects or the bizarre experiments he hid in the woods where they wouldn't scare anyone, then she would have to think about other things. Like how much she missed him. And while Daine was more than happy to cut her hands on sharp rocks, she refused to deliberately hurt herself that badly.

She kept climbing. While she climbed she muttered under her breath – something between a prayer and a plea, but not really either, and not really words. There weren't any words.

"Daine." A voice said almost as soon as she reached the stones, and the girl nearly cried out in relief. Her father caught her elbow to steady her, and helped her over the last shelf of rocks. "It's good to see you."

"Da!" She whispered, and her eyes filled with tears. He patted her head a little awkwardly.

"You need a hug." Sarra appeared at her other side and sat her down, holding her close like some comforting genii who the girl had just summoned. She looked narrowly at her daughter, and shook her shoulder a little. "And you need some sleep. You look exhausted."

"I am. Well, I've been travelling for a few days. That's all, but I'm on foot and always on guard, so I've only been able to take quick naps."

"On your own?" Sarra frowned, and even if her husband was ambivalent, there was genuine concern in the woman's voice. "Where's Numair?"

Daine scratched awkwardly at one of her arms. "I don't know. I... I really hoped that you might."

She didn't dare look up at her father. If he had made any sound she thought she might burst into tears, but for once he pushed his dislike of his daughter's companion to one side. Perhaps it was Sarra's influence, because this place was closer to the domain of women than Weiryn's verdant hunting lands, and it was her arm that was strong around the girl's shoulders.

"Have you any reason to think that he's... in danger?" Weiryn asked very, very carefully. Daine shrugged, finally meeting his eyes.

"It's the middle of a war, da. Just a mortal war, I suppose, but he's no safer than any other person out there. And there are these... these killing machines, and last I heard he was plannin' on catching one and finding out what makes them kill." She snorted then, sounding extraordinarily like her father in her scorn. "I never heard anything so stupid! If it's made to kill then he should kill it back, not... not throw himself onto its claws and expect it to just... surrender!" She shook her head and added. "So we fought about that, and the next day I was sent to Giantkiller, and I've not heard anything of him since."

"Hm." Weiryn turned away, looking thoughtful. While he mused, Sarra hummed a small tune into Daine's hair and absently stroked the girl's fringe back from her face, as she had when Daine was a child living in their cottage in Galla.

Daine shut her eyes, letting herself be comforted. For the first time in months – since she had last seen Numair - she felt safe. Even if there were killing machines nearby, there was absolutely no way they would fit through that slate chasm. Even if they did, one or both of her parents would send them screaming away faster than they could draw their swords. She sighed, and rested her head against her mother's shoulder.

"Ma," she murmured, "Do you ever miss the way things used to be?"

The goddess looked pensive. "Sometimes, if I'm honest. I miss the way the sun always looked different when it rose over the mountain, and I miss our little home, and I miss having my little girl around." She smiled against Daine's temple. "But then, even if we were still in Galla, there would still be this war, and you would still be less of a little girl."

"The sunrise would still be pretty, though."

"The world doesn't turn just for its sunrises, dear heart."

"That's such a goddess-y nothing-answer, ma."

"Is it!" The woman mimed shock, and then added more gently. "Then I guess I would have to say... I miss hearing my heart beat."

"Doesn't it beat?" Daine looked at her, appalled, and then pressed her ear to the woman's chest. Sure enough, where there should have been the living thud of a strong beating heart, there was only silence. Now that she was paying attention she realised that her mother hadn't been drawing breaths in and out either; she simply existed, without needing the clumsy tools of life to keep her in motion.

It made Daine feel quite peculiar. She rubbed at her forehead fretfully, sitting upright and away from her mother as if her slightest touch might turn the un-alive creature into dust.

"It's alright," Sarra said, patting her hand. She felt warm and solid, and not like a dead thing at all. "It scared me too, when I first realised it had stopped. Of course," She mused, "I was in the dark realms by then. It's not so strange when you're there. Everyone's got the same problem."

For the first time since she had awoken in the divine realms three years ago, Daine realised that her mother wasn't really alive. She had known that the woman was changed – a goddess, not a mortal, wrapped in green silk shawls and silver magic rather than pink. But she had still thought, since Sarra was walking and talking... or, granted, floating above wells and singing... that the woman was still effectively her mother. Now that seemed different, in a bittersweet way.

The strangest realisation was that, in a few short years, Daine would still be growing older and her mother would still be thirty-one: the age she had been when she had died. When Daine was thirty-two, she would be older than her own mother would ever be.

The thoughts troubled her, but there was something else, too. She didn't feel at all well.

"Daine," Sarra was looking at her with concern. "Darling, if you hadn't had that fight with Numair would you still be looking for him?"

"Two months is a long time not to have news," she managed. The goddess shrugged.

"But you said – you've been on missions, and you're on your own a lot, so it's not like it's easy to get messages to you. Last time we saw you Numair was telling me that by the time he'd sent a message to one camp, you'd moved on to the next, so you never heard from him. No wonder he worries, the poor man."

"He's moving about a lot too, this time." Daine admitted slowly, "So I think we must keep missing each other. The killing machine camps get razed so often that any messages..." she swallowed rapidly at that and then forced a smile. "Well, there's not much point in trying."

"And yet, you are." Sarra raised an eyebrow. "So... why? Out with it, young lady."

Daine looked down at her feet, and then slowly took off the chain that hung around her neck. Beside the heavy badger claw was a second silver loop, but instead of a pendant there was a broken twist that had once been a charm link.

"I can't remember when it broke." Daine whispered, "I don't know for definite, but... ma, I think I might be pregnant."

"Yes." Sarra said, and by the uncanny light in her eyes her daughter knew it was the goddess speaking, who knew and had known all along. Daine gulped and looked away.

"Oh."

"Oh." The goddess agreed, and hugged her tightly for a moment. "So we need to find him for you, don't we?"

"Bother finding him. He'll just move again, the inconstant little worm. I'll take you to him." Weiryn said suddenly, breaking into their conversation with gruff ease. When both Daine and Sarra gaped at him, the god shrugged and met their eyes defiantly. "What? If he won't do the honourable thing _now,_ I'll be proven entirely right in my reading of that man."

"Da, I've told you before that I'm the one who keeps refusing to get married, not Numair!"

Weiryn ignored that rather important piece of trivia and became suddenly efficient, reciting the few rules that bound his kind. "Is there anywhere else you need to be? Anyone you're meeting? Any mortal plans I will be interfering with by doing this?"

"N...no." She stammered, suddenly feeling like the world was spinning far too quickly. "I'm on patrol, and I can send a speaking spell. But, da..."

"Stop arguing." Sarra laughed into her ear. "He's trying to be nice, love. He just can't bring himself to admit that it's going to be nice for Numair, too. It'll be all insults and conspiracies until he gets bored, I'm afraid."

"He's probably wrapped around another woman," Weiryn said, as if slyly proving his wife's point. "One who he didn't take for granted and then lose in the middle of a war, like a set of keys..."

"Thank you, da." Daine tried to sound sarcastic, but she was too happy to really carry it off. The god smiled – a suddenly bright expression which made him glow – and looped his arm through hers. He pointed with his bow towards a group of rocks, which formed an impossible barrier.

"We'll go that way, I think." He mused, and simply stepped forward, bearing her with him. Daine winced and closed her eyes at the last moment, sure that at any second she would be crushed against the slate wall. But nothing happened, and when she opened her eyes again she was standing somewhere where she had never been before. Here, as in the slate chasm, the odd teeth of standing stones stabbed their way up towards the sky.

"Ah, yes." Weiryn noticed her looking, and patted one of the stones. "We're simple gods, daughter, so we have to play by the simple rules. The blue-folk decided this is how we crossed, and so we began to use them. After a few centuries I think I lost the knack for normal travel." He scowled and looked at his feet for a second. "The elder gods think it's very... sweet."

"I'm not a god." She reminded him, and he shrugged.

"Your man is that way." He pointed, then added. "I would hurry, if I were you."

"Why...?" Daine gaped at him, but the god was already fading into the trees. This was worrisome; he was not allowed to interfere in things which could tip the scales of mortal life, and she couldn't think of any other reason why he would melt into the scrubby trees. She shaped her ears into the sensitive arches of a bat, and flinched when she heard the sound of fighting. Dragging her bow free from across her shoulders, she sprinted as fast as she could in that direction.

Fighting. The sounds grew closer, louder, but then they changed. These weren't the desperate cries of a scuffle where people were scared for their own safety. She heard laughter, and glib remarks, and she could still here the sound of metal hitting leather – weapons hitting armour – which was a far more sinister sound when there was no-one defending themselves against it. She slowed as she neared the sound and shrank her ears back, changing her eyes instead to peer through the tall foliage.

A group of men were loitering in a clearing, surrounding something on the ground. They were bruised and bleeding, and their leather armour looked oddly dark in some places, as if it had been burned. Daine recognised the lightweight armour that the Scanran raiding parties wore, but worse, she recognised the odd sigils which had been embossed into their jerkins. It was a crude shielding spell, about as refined as a stone wall in a glass building, but it was good at stopping magical attacks for long enough to stage... say... an ambush.

Her blood ran cold. She knew exactly what the shape they were clustered around was.

Without stopping to think, she strung one arrow to her bow, fired it, and had a second in the air before it even found the man's throat. The third arrow spun wide, hitting a branch loudly enough to make more of the men turn around, and then the first two men let out great screams and rattled their life out through the gaping wounds in their throats.

There were nearly twenty men still standing, and they charged towards the hidden archer with blades already bared in their fists.

 _Blind them!_ Daine screamed. Summoned by her fury, hundreds of birds flocked from the trees and tore into the clearing, landing with heavy thuds and sharp claws outstretched into vulnerable faces laid naked by the small Scanran helmets. The men cried out and tore at the birds, but the creatures dodged skilfully. For every creature that darted away another sped back – kestrels at killer speeds, wood-doves with heavy force – and their skin ran in red tatters from hundreds of eager claws.

Daine picked them off one by one, shooting cleanly and without mercy. Every single man fell, and not a single bird was hurt. The girl thanked them all with true, blinding gratitude, and they disappeared as quickly as they had appeared.

She could see the shape that was still huddled in the dust, and her blood ran cold. She was right: it was Numair. He wasn't moving.

With a cry, she darted over to him and skidded to a halt in the bloodstained dirt. Not moving. Not even... no, he was breathing. He was, because she saw him shudder in pain as he tried to draw in a deeper breath and couldn't. She felt sick seeing him in pain even as she thanked the gods for that sign that he was, at least, alive.

The men must have ambushed him. That many men, in their spelled armour, would have lain in wait for the mage, not knowing who he was but able to detect his aura. It was a risk, Numair had told her often enough, but he couldn't do much to conceal himself from scryers. Normally he was strong enough to overpower them, so there wasn't a huge amount of danger. But this... this looked like a trap, and Numair had been caught in it.

He tried to raise his head and struggled, and bright blood bloomed from a great wound on the side of his skull. Daine cried out and wrapped her arms around him, drawing him back against a tree and helping him to sit up.

"Numair," she whispered, and then louder. "Numair, wake up! Please, love, please wake up."

His eyes flew open at the sound of her voice, and he choked in a laboured breath. The girl guessed one of his ribs, at least, was broken. His voice was harsh, but perfectly incredulous. " _Daine_?"

"Yes," she smiled, but she was too worried to be happy to see him yet. Her voice grew urgent. "Numair, you're badly hurt. You have to tell me..."

"Daine," He choked, and throwing clumsy arms around her he held her so tightly that the girl could barely breathe. That first cry became a half sobbed chant. "Daine, Daine, Daine, Daine, love, please tell me you're not hurt..."

"You're the one who's bleeding, mortal." Weiryn appeared suddenly behind them. His voice was harsh. "Look to yourself."

"He won't until... Numair, look at me, love. Look at me – see? I'm fine. I'm not hurt." Daine smiled reassuringly and pushed the tumble of bloodstained hair back from his face, meeting his frantic eyes. Slowly, slowly his violent shaking eased, and his white-knuckled hands loosened from where they dug into her back. Daine kissed his forehead then and sighed, resting her cheek against his for a long moment. "That's right, love."

"How peculiar." Weiryn muttered, as if he were watching an animal in a menagerie. Despite his scathing words there was an oddness in his voice, and if Numair had looked up he would have seen a new respect in the god's dark gaze. He didn't, though. His eyes were still fixed on Daine as the girl raised careful fingertips to the bleeding wound above his ear.

"This really isn't good." She checked his eyes, and bit her lip at seeing one pupil was dilated and the other so bloodshot the white of his eye was bright red. "Gods! No wonder that blow knocked you out. I'm surprised you're even awake now."

"Wha' are you doin' here?" Numair, as always, was concentrating on the important things. His voice had gone from panicked to bleary, and he looked as if he might pass out again. The girl scowled at the question.

"I'm fair sure I don't even know where 'here' is! Are we anywhere near a healer? We need to find one as quickly as possible."

"It's Scanra." Weiryn offered, and crouched next to them both. Daine rolled her eyes in frustration.

"That's so helpful, da. Knowing that doesn't help me get him to a healer before he bleeds into his brain, does it?"

"Oh, stop being so dramatic." Her father flexed and unflexed a hand lazily. "I know you both dislike this fact, miss 'you're my da, not my god', but I do have some uses. You have to ask, though. Answering prayers means I can interfere in the mortal realms."

"Th... healer's not so... far... 'way..." Numair mumbled. The girl shook her head in amazement and swatted his arm.

"Don't be petty love." She looked up, her voice desperate. "Please, da... Lord Weiryn. I'll burn incense to you and everything if you heal him."

"Why're you here?" Numair caught her wrist, and looked completely dazedly up at her when she looked around. He blinked, and then shook his head. "I'm prob'ly dreamin'."

"Da, _please."_ Daine pleaded, her eyes filling with tears. The god huffed at her expression.

"Oh, don't get so upset, Veralidaine. I don't want him to die any more than you do."

"Definitely dreamin'." Numair decided, and his eyes fluttered shut. Weiryn gently pushed Daine away from him and knelt closer, staring at the man's forehead as if he could see through it to the damage beyond. "Fragile human," he muttered, and pressed a not-too-gentle hand to Numair's head. "Deer skulls are much harder to break."

Daine didn't answer, but chewed nervously on her lip as silver light bloomed around the god's fingers and sank into Numair's head. The man sighed, and then coughed out something that looked almost like blood, but disappeared like smoke at a growled command from Weiryn.

"If he were a deer I could heal him myself," Daine whispered.

"You couldn't heal this." Weiryn said, and in those few words the girl realised how bad the wound must have been. She clutched at Numair's arm. Burying her face in his shoulder, she was silent for a few long minutes, until Numair choked and sat up.

"Oh, gods!" Daine cried, and dissolved into sobs for a very long time. Numair raised his hand to the shoulder she was muffling her tears against and touched her cheek gently, as if he wasn't quite sure that she was really there. Then he looked around, blinked very sluggishly at the god who was glowering at him, and took a deep breath.

"Oh, you're here too." he said matter-of-factly, "So... that explains more than it doesn't."

"You were ambushed, you idiot. Why am I not surprised?" Weiryn grumbled. Numair nodded, looking shamefaced as he tentatively tried to move.

"I was... arrogant. Stupid. This pass has been clear for so long we hadn't even sent scouts along it. They had a mage-trap ready for me." He swallowed rapidly, seeing the bodies of the men who were sprawled, mutilated and pierced, across the clearing. Raising himself to his knees, he caught Daine's shoulders and drew her closer. "Thank you, Daine, thank you so much for being here. Stop crying, sweetling. Please, love, or I'll start too."

"I'll be back," Daine choked out, not daring to look at him in case she burst into tears anew, and without another word she darted away into the forest. Numair watched her go, fiddling awkwardly with a scrap of leather that had been torn free of his boot in the fight. Against the rags of his clothes, his newly-healed vibrancy looked bizarre.

"You saved my life!" Numair said softly to Weiryn, so that wherever she was the girl wouldn't be able to overhear. "You brought Daine here at exactly the right time, when you could have just scryed on me. You came to help me!"

"It was an accident." The god insisted, folding his arms and scowling fiercely. Numair looked at him, and looked away to the trail Daine had darted through, and then back to the girl's father.

"I'll remember it like that to Daine," he said, "If that's what you'd prefer. She's too upset to see it, so I don't think she'll work it out. But... I'll still know it's true."

"Lie to yourself all you want. I don't care what mortals think." The god sneered, and folded his arms arrogantly. In a clap of sound, he vanished.


	3. The Second Solstice: Part 2

"Why is it always chipmunks?"

Daine looked up. She was lying on her stomach in a clearing, eye to eye with the small mammal who was chattering merrily away at her. Numair had pushed through the trees with his normal silence, and even his best friend hadn't noticed him coming into the clearing. She didn't have a clue what he was asking her, though. So she shook her head with a confused smile and he explained,

"Whenever you run away from me in tears, I seem to find you talking to a chipmunk in the woods somewhere."

"Oh! But he's a river rat," Daine pointed out, bidding the creature goodbye. She was scrambling to her feet even before the rodent had darted away, and threw her arms around Numair. He stopped her with a pained cry, and she loosened her arms immediately, but she couldn't stop tears from falling down her cheeks as she stared at him.

"You were dying," she whispered. When she raised her hand and ran her hand through his hair it felt sticky with blood, and the girl shuddered. He caught her hand, shaking his head, and pressed it against his chest.

"I don't think it was so bad," he murmured, trying to look calm but only managing a shaky smile. "Your father just wanted an excuse to yell at me."

"You were dying. They nearly killed you!" she insisted, her grey eyes wide in the greenish light. A vulnerable note crept into her voice, and she swallowed heavily before saying, "You can't do things like that. You _mustn't_. You're such an... an idiot!"

He held her more closely for a moment, and then his breath hitched in his chest and he pulled away. Cupping her face between his hands, he managed:"I'm so glad to see you, love, but it hurts."

"Didn't da heal your ribs?"Daine scowled, and drew the side of his shirt up to see the livid bruising. Raising her voice, she declared to the heavens: "What a rotten, doltish mule you are!"

"I won't complain. I'm alive, at least." Numair said, and kissed her forehead soothingly. Daine folded her arms, utterly unimpressed. They were still in the middle of enemy territory, and for all she knew there could be another mob of Scanrans ready to ambush them around the next corner. The only reason she felt that she could let her guard down at all was that the animals were all content; if there had been humans or hostile immortals nearby, then the birds would have been screaming.

It might not last. It rarely did.

"We need to find you a healer before anything else happens." She said. "Where are we?"

"Yes, so that's another good point," Numair raised an eyebrow at her. "How is it, my dear little magelet, that you can find a single man in the middle of a huge forest, but you have absolutely no idea where you are?"

"Da brought me to you," Daine mumbled, suddenly evasive. That was a mistake, because of course Numair picked up on it. He caught her chin between long fingers and forced her to meet his eyes. His voice was quite pleasant, almost cheerful, and ruthlessly curious.

" _Why_?"

She opened her mouth to say something, then hesitated. "You're hurt and I'm out of arrows." She finally declared, looking sternly up at him. "I won't tell you a single word of it until you're safe and healed up."

He sighed and let go of her chin. "I forgot how stubborn you can be."

They walked painfully back to the camp which Numair said he had left a few hours before. It was an old, crumbling bailey which had been rebuilt into a fortress. New structures of stone and timber jutted out from the ancient slate building at odd angles, and there was a large curtain wall made of makeshift pine cut into lethal spikes at the top. The barricades were spelled to resist fire, and Daine recognised the careless lines of Numair's spell-crafting in the runes carved onto the gates.

There were stones, too: heavy boulders which had been dragged from the earth by superhuman hands. It was obvious to Daine what her friend had been doing here, and it was equally clear that he had spent a goodly amount of his gift protecting these people before heading towards the next camp. She tightened her grip on his hand, half-reproving, and Numair gave her an apologetic smile.

"I know," he said, looking abashed. "But they're so vulnerable out here, and I couldn't leave them as they were."

"You might have rested before setting out," Daine scolded him. "An extra day's sleep would have made you strong enough to protect your stupid skull from those soldiers."

"But then you wouldn't have found me."

"You don't know that." She cut her eyes up at him, and pulled a face at his curious expression. "Stop trying to guess!"

The guards were shocked to see Numair returning so soon, and even more stunned when they caught sight of his companion, but the sentries waved them past and the commanders did not question either of the bloodstained visitors until the wooden portcullis was solidly shut behind them.

"We're safe now," Numair said pointedly. Daine sighed.

"I said safe and _healed."_

"I feel fine." He insisted, and promptly slipped in a patch of mud. While he recovered his footing and took a few pained breaths, Daine caught his elbow.

"Fine?" She teased him, trying not to look worried. "You're limping."

"It's a dance step, sweetling. I'm dancing because I'm so happy to see you."

"Well, that dance looks fair painful, my love. I don't think it'll catch on."

"One day," he burst out, plaintively but with some exaggeration, "I swear you and I will have a reunion like in the legends, with birds singing and the sun shining and neither of us nearly dying. When the Lion Knights tell their princesses they're dying to see them again, I'm sure they don't mean it quite so literally. It's supposed to be _romantic."_

Daine couldn't help smiling at that. She was still trying to think of a reply when the camp commander rushed up to them, nodding a greeting to Numair and staring openly at the girl he was with. It was someone Daine did not know, but by the way he was looking from her to Numair she had a good idea that he knew exactly who she was.

"Mistress Sarrasri," he greeted her, confirming her suspicions, "Welcome to Fort Taimiat."

"Taimiat?" Daine echoed, looking incredulously at him, "But that's clear on the other side of..."

"Ssh." Numair squeezed her hand. "I'm sure Captain Crannat has better things to do than chat to us, magelet."

"Not particularly, if this chatting will give me some answers." the man replied, a little stiffly. "We thought you had left, sir."

"Ah, yes." Numair rubbed at his hair awkwardly, and then winced and lowered the arm when the action jarred his ribs. "Well, I was ambushed by a mage trap, sir. Daine was passing, thank the gods, and helped me to escape."

"Helped?" Daine gaped at him. "You were fair set to be worm food!"

"... but we've had to return to ask for your healer, since I've hurt my ribs and... it seems... my ego, in the struggle."

"Ri-ight." The captain said slowly, and nodded. "Well, it's no inconvenience, Master Salmalin. It's not like anyone rushed to take your room. Perhaps this time you could try to tidy it before you leave, hm?"

Daine smothered a laugh at Numair's chastened expression and they both followed the captain towards the bailey. When they pushed open the heavy, rotting door and stepped into the room which Numair had been living in, the girl understood why none of the men wanted to give up their own rooms for it. Although the room was huge and held ancient, ornate furniture, the wind whistled through cracks in the stones and the whole place was dank and chilly. Added to that was the mess; the piles of discarded papers and bits of wood which had spoiled runes carved into them. There were a few blunt daggers, too, and a carpenters' set which had overflowed towards the hearth. A sulky fire was struggling to stay lit, and Daine quickly threw some of the spoiled wood into it.

"Thank you," she said to the captain, and he bowed without even a hint of a smile. Numair nodded his own gratitude, but now that he was in his room he looked almost grey with pain and weariness.

"I'll send some food and water, and a healer as soon as we have one," the captain said, seeing this. "They're working flat out at the moment, so..."

"I understand," Daine said, trying not to look too worried. "I'll look after him in the meantime."

Numair waited until the door closed behind them, and then he leaned dizzily back against the soft, damp wood. With his eyes shut and a distant voice he said, "I don't need looking after, Daine."

"You do," She replied, implacable. Adding more wood to the fire, she added, "If you're through being so damned proud, Numair, you should come and get warm. I'm fair sure you're in shock." Seeing him still hesitating, she softened a little and added, "Please, love. You know you don't have to pretend around me."

He rubbed his face with his grubby hands and, wincing, lowered himself to the rug beside her. Not looking at her, he muttered, "I didn't want the first time you saw me in months to be... like this."

"Come here," Daine sat cross-legged by the fire and caught his shoulders, lying him down so his head was resting in her lap. She stroked his hair back from his eyes, studying him seriously and hiding a smile when he looked worriedly up at her.

"What are you thinking, Daine?"

The girl pursed her lips and tilted her head to one side. "I'm thinking... it's definitely you under all that mud."

"Mud?" He raised his hands, cringed, and lowered them again. "Gods, I'm filthy."

"Mm-hm." Daine hummed her agreement, and then leaned down and kissed him. He caught his breath, surprised, and then his lips parted under hers and his hand reached up to tangle in her hair, gentle and insistent, and there were no words for a long time.

It was the first true kiss they had shared in months, and they said far more in those silent minutes than they ever could in words. The sweet, loving gentleness they began with grew slower, more careful, as each described long weeks of loneliness and forgave the other for their silence. Then there was the quickness, the warmth that made them laugh and press closer to each other, turning to mischievous nips and shivering touches, in open wonder that they were both safe and alive. In their kiss they shared the sure knowledge that even in the middle of enemy country they were happy, because they were with the only person in the world who truly mattered.

It would have gone further, and gods, how they both longed for it! But they also shared weariness, and Numair's injuries were never far from either of their thoughts. And so Daine finally pulled away, happy but with a concerned glance at her lover's pale skin. Numair shook his head at her concern, and was just about to pull her back (she wouldn't have resisted for long, he knew!) when they heard a tap at the door.

It wasn't a healer, but a recruit who held a jug full of steaming water, another of cold and (tucked precariously under one arm) a basket of food which steamed invitingly. Daine thanked him, and brought it back to the fire. A hungry hunt through the basket revealed a fascinating insight into the chaos of the mess hall: half-burned venison, a precariously sawn off end of chewy bread, a strange jar of what turned out to be damson jam, and a flagon of fresh, creamy goats' milk.

They ate ravenously. Daine hunted through her own bag as she finished her bread and jam, finding a bar of soap and washcloth. Shredding some of the hard, fatty soap into the hot water jug, she swirled it around with her fingers, scalding them a little, and then added some cold.

"I'm perfectly capable of washing myself, Daine," Numair pointed out through a mouthful of food. The woman shrugged.

"First up, I'm a better healer than you, but unless you turn into a bird I can't do much except stop you gettin' an infection in the time it'll take for the healer to arrive."

"Can you heal me if I'm a bird?" He interrupted, intrigued. "You always said I was terrible at being a _proper_ bird, just good at pretending to be one. I always assumed your magic felt the same way."

"Unless you have enough magic left to try... which, looking at you, I really don't think you do... then I'm thinking that's just a stupid clever question we can answer another time."

"Fair enough," he grinned at her. "What was your second point?"

She looked at him levelly. "The quicker I'm satisfied you're all fixed up, the quicker I'll be telling you why I'm here."

"Ugh." He lay flat on his back, staring at the ceiling with a huff. "The woman uses my own curious nature as a weapon against me! Dear Shakith, why do you torture me so?"

Daine laughed and unlaced his shirt. "You're just complaining for the sake of complaining now. I don't recall you having any objections the last time I gave you a bath."

"That was a _very_ different situation..." he started adamantly, and then laughed when she gave him a quick, if heated, kiss. "Well, perhaps not so very different..."

"What is it with you and wanting everything to be romantic?" She asked, helping him to sit up and helping pull his shirt up over his protesting arms. Numair caught his breath in pain, and she held his shoulders comfortingly for a long moment.

"Don't you?" He asked, a little shakily. Daine bit her lip, thinking.

"Well, I don't know. Seems to me when we're together I love you, and when we're not I miss you, and that feeling's the same whether you're recitin' poetry at me or talking about killing machines."

"But I don't want to talk to you like a... a comrade, when we're alone together. I should be letting you know what you mean to me." He lay back down with a sigh of relief, eyes shut. Daine shook her head, a little amused.

"So when we're comrades... when you defend me in a battle, or when I shoot people to save your silly life, you think we're... what? Totally indifferent to each other?"

"That's not what I mean at all." He opened one eye. "I feel the finer points of romance are lost on you, magelet. You're so forthright and damned _honest_ that I can tell you I love you, and that's enough for you. But I have so much more I want to say and do."

Daine squeezed water out of the washcloth and started gently cleaning the blood from his face and neck, wincing at how much was pooled in the hollow of his shoulderblade. "Today I nearly lost you, Numair. You can't be saying to me that things don't feel proper when I'm just so, so happy to be able to touch you right now. Flowers and poems and stories seem fair stupid next to that. It's not romantic, but it's more what's real than... than any of that nonsense."

He didn't answer for a long time, but caught up her free hand and gently stroked her fingers. Daine smiled and kissed his clean cheek before taking her hand away and starting to clean his grimy arm.

"Daine," the man's voice was quiet, "When we look back on all this, don't you think we'll just remember being... being scared for each other? The best thing we have is a few pathetic hours in months, when we happen to be sent to the same forts."

"What's the other option?" She glanced at him and switched arms, moving around him so she didn't have to draw his arm across his broken ribs. "Juggling?"

"You say that like it's a bad thing." He grumbled, and then stopped her with a pained effort. "I mean it, Daine. This war can't last much longer, and we're just going to remember it as the time we spent apart. If I'm being 'fair stupid' with all my romance, it's only because I want there to be something sweet and pure about what we have. It's fair enough to say that living like this is fine because we love each other, but sometimes I feel like I'm taking advantage of you."

"Don't make it sound so... sordid." Daine wrinkled her nose and rinsed her rag, moving to clean his chest. "This will hurt, love."

"What other word is there? It is sordid. We're not married," he insisted, "And we hardly ever see each other. When we do see each other we spend all our time either arguing or in bed, and then we both go our separate ways and don't even talk for weeks, if the birds can't get through." He cried out in pain, and then said through gritted teeth, "I know captains who see their whores more than I see you, Daine."

"So..." she bit the inside of her cheek, wondering why on earth she wasn't slapping him right now. She really, really hoped it was the pain talking. "So you're trying to be romantic with me because you think that if you recite enough poetry, that means I'm not your whore?"

"Pay attention, Daine. You know that's not what I said."

"Either I'm your whore, or I'm acting like a slut." She repeated, wringing out the cloth with a vengeance. "Which you are too, if we're pointing fingers. I don't recall ever having to seduce you into my bed."

"See? We're already fighting."

"This isn't a fight." She snapped. "This is you being an incurable ass."

There was a cough, and a polite tap at the door. Numair flushed bright red, realising that whoever was outside had overheard what Daine had just said. She tossed her hair back angrily and yanked the door open, treating the poor man who was waiting outside to a death glare. He bowed, trying to hide a smirk.

"I'm Siffa, the healer, Miss." He nodded towards Numair, pushed his way into the room, and whistled softly at the rainbow of bruises that decorated the man's torso. "Isn't that a sight! You can even see their footprints!"

"He has two cracked ribs on the right side, and I think the one on the left is just bruised, but it might be a hairline fracture that I missed." Daine said flatly. Both Numair and the healer stared at her, and then Siffa looked down at Numair with his gift and nodded up at Daine with new respect in his eyes.

"Yes, that seems about right. Thank you, miss. Well, this will take some time, then. And it will hurt. You might need a distraction, sir."

"Daine?" Numair looked up, "Perhaps you could tell me your secret now."

"Ohh no." She pulled a face. "I'm only good for screwing and having arguments with, remember?"

"For Mynoss' sake, Daine..."

"I have to send a message to Raoul." She interrupted him, and left without a word of goodbye. The healer shook his head, although whether it was over the argument or Numair's injuries was hard to tell.

"I didn't actually say that to her." Numair said, sounding a little petulant. Siffa shrugged.

"It's not my business. But even if you didn't, if it's what she _heard_ , then I think she's right to be angry." He pressed his palm to Numair's left hand side and shut his eyes. "Ready?"


	4. The Second Solstice: Part 3

Daine scribbled the note out in her hasty scrawl, and then scowled and took the time to copy it out more neatly on the back of the paper. She was in no hurry to get back, she told herself. It was a lie, but she was angry enough at Numair to repeat the words to herself over and over until she thought it was true. If she was being honest, then she would have admitted she was lying and hurried back to him as soon as she had let her commander know that she was safe. Being with Numair was something she had desperately missed, even if she was furious at him. Being in the same keep as him and yet separated felt like torture.

Still, she slowed her fingers and wrote neatly, and coiled the scrap of paper up into a small, light roll. Then she headed through the tower, asking the doves where their handler was. They cooed and fluttered at her uselessly, as dull witted as chickens when they were so far removed from their homes, and eventually she found the man napping in a corner.

"Excuse me, sir?" She asked, and then held out the note. "I need to send this to Giantkiller, please."

"Yes, ma'am," the man stammered, and leapt to his feet. He had almost sent a bird on its way before he realised that the girl was still waiting, impatiently holding out the scrap of paper for him to take. He reddened and took it. His hands shook from embarrassment when he tried to slip it into the dove's foot cartridge, and eventually Daine took over from him. She didn't want him hurting the bird's fragile feet in his nervousness.

"Thank you, mistress..?"

"Sarrasri." She finished automatically, and let the bird go. It burst out of the tower with a shriek of joy, and headed towards the distant fort like an arrow. When Daine turned away from the darkening evening sky the man was staring at her, and she froze. "Wh... what's wrong?"

"Wrong? Nothing, miss." The man nodded obsequiously. "Would that be Veralidaine Sarrasri, miss?"

"Yes?"

"Then please wait a moment." He said rapidly, and then dove away into the small anteroom. Daine resisted the urge to follow him, especially when the crashing sounds of a search began, but he reappeared almost as rapidly as he had vanished. "Here!" He declared, and dumped something into her hands.

"What's this?" Daine asked, nonplussed. The man shrugged.

"They're for you, miss." When the girl looked down at the wooden box he'd handed her, he explained, "Every day, it was, he came up here with a new one. We told him no-one knew where you were, that you were scoutin' and sending back checkpoints, but he kept bringin' 'em anyway. Said that we were to send them all the minute anyone got news of you."

"Him? Do you mean Numair?" She asked, her eyes widening. He hesitated.

"The Black Mage, miss? Him that called the stones for the walls."

"Oh." She couldn't think of anything else to say, but stared silently at the box for a very long time until the man finally reached for it, as if to take it back.

"Does he know you're here, miss? He might want them back, since you're here face to face, like."

"He knows," Daine winced, remembering how they had parted, and bowed her head towards the dove handler. She tightened her grip on the box, feeling the cheap wood bending under her fingers. "Thank you, sir."

She waited until she was outside before she opened the box. Despite her impatient steps towards the well-lit courtyard she still had to force herself to raise the lid. For some reason it felt almost like prying, although they were all letters that had been written to her. If she had been in Haven or one of the camps then she would have wept to receive one of these notes, and now she held a whole box full and felt half-frozen. There were people there, looking curiously at her, and she ducked into an alcove to avoid their prying eyes.

 _Why should I read them?_ She thought, frustrated at herself. _He's just inside that bailey._

She unrolled one of them even as she scolded herself, and read it in the same divided mind. Then she stopped, looking as if she were paralysed, and leant back against the stones. Letting the paper fall back into the box, she picked up another and read that, too.

It was impossible to write much on the tiny scraps of paper, and these were almost black from ink. And what had he said? They weren't love letters, or military reports, or the kind of romantic nonsense she had argued with him about. Some were sweet enough, hoping she was well and asking her to stay safe. Some were things he thought she would find interesting – _Daine, in Seemita Camp there's a new way they train the horses..._ and some were silly, funny stories or acerbic observations which he had written down.

What were these letters? She had half expected courtly nonsense, but Numair wasn't flirting with her, he was simply talking to her. These were the things which they would have spoken about face to face, but when they were separated there was no-one for him to talk to. And so Daine read them, and understood the loneliness behind them, and knew it had been as painful as her own. This was the same feeling she had told her parents about. Who would he tell?

 _The Black Mage, miss?_ She remembered the look of fear on the dove handler's face, and the grudging respect of the commander. No, there was no-one that her friend could confide in here. She shut the box slowly, and then straightened up.

The healer had almost finished when she returned, sitting in a tailor-seat with the glow of magic streaming through his hands into healing flesh. It looked as if Numair was asleep. It was more likely that he was meditating; he had spent half of his life practicing separating his mind from his body, so using it to escape the pain of a bone-healing was probably second nature to him. Daine sat beside them, folding her legs under her and chewing her lip. When the healer's eyes opened she smiled her thanks.

"There," the man patted Numair's shoulder, and then shrugged at his empty expression. "Damned ungrateful things, mages. Well, when he brings himself out of it, ma'am, tell him he's not to let anyone kick him in the ribs again for a few weeks. One of them nearly pierced his lung, and I don't have enough magic going spare to treat owt but the dangerous stuff. He'll be aching something fierce tonight, and he needs to take it easy for another week, at least."

"Yes, sir. I'll tell him." Daine nodded, and gingerly took Numair's limp hand as the healer left. It only took another minute or so before the man's eyes fluttered open, and his fingers tightened around hers.

"I'm sorry, Daine." Numair whispered, his voice still raspy with pain. The girl shook her head and brushed his hair back from his eyes, and he sighed. Perhaps it was from the slow way the pain was starting to ebb away or from relief at her easy forgiveness, but the tension lifted from his shoulders and he began to breathe more evenly.

They stayed silent for a long time. Daine wanted to say something, but every time she started to speak it felt like her throat was parched. She lost count of the number of times she stopped herself and tried again. It was just so difficult to say what she really meant, because she was so frightened that it would sound wrong that she didn't dare begin. When the girl finally spoke she regretted the words as soon as they fell from her lips.

"The people here are scared of you."

"Yes." Numair opened his eyes slowly and answered her simply. He didn't ask why she had said anything. Looking up unflinchingly, he didn't even hide the fact that the people's fear caused him pain. Daine touched his cheek apologetically.

"And other places, too?"

"Yes." He shrugged, and winced when it jarred his ribs. "Everywhere."

"Everywhere." She echoed, and rested her forehead against his, feeling unbearably sad. "Then they don't know you. I think that'd be your fault, love. You don't let them see you."

"It's not all bad. I mean, you know me quite well." He smiled slightly, "Even if you don't always understand what I try to say."

"Ssh, you idiot. You already apologised. Let's forget the whole dratted thing." She kissed his forehead and moved back, helping him to sit up. He straightened with a groan, and Daine wrapped her arm around his waist playfully. "I think I've decided, then. You definitely need more people who love you than just me."

"I really don't." He grinned a little, teasing her. "It's a nice offer, mind you, but I wouldn't want to make you jealous."

"I can always storm out again, Master Salmalin! I didn't mean another woman, for starters, and for seconds I didn't mean to make it sound like I'm giving you a choice, here."

He blinked, rubbed his forehead a little, and shook his head. "I honestly can't work out what you mean. I can think of a few things that you could be saying, but nothing that..." he laughed a little, then stared at her. "Wait. Daine, what are you saying?"

"Gods, and you're supposed to be the clever one." She couldn't help smiling, though, and her sarcastic words fell flat. He went from pale to pink in a bare second as his quick mind caught up with what his tired ears refused to hear.

"Daine... Daine, sweetlng, wait. Wait." He caught her arms and held her in place, looking quite serious and a little flustered. "Don't tell me anything. Not yet."

"What? After all that begging?" She genuinely couldn't believe her ears. "And my da brought me here specially to tell you, and everything. If I'd known you'd stop me before I even said a word, I'd've taken the time to walk!"

He didn't answer, but struggled to his feet and away from the fire. Daine watched him go in perplexed silence, resisting the urge to stand up and help him. It was obvious that he had sunk into his own world, and she knew from the years she had lived with him that it was useless to try to talk him out of it. Usually this kind of frantic introspection had more to do with a book or a spell than anything Daine might have said, so she watched with frank curiosity as he dropped to his knees beside his travel pack.

The first thing he did, wincing as his newly-healed ribs ached, was tug a clean shirt on. Oblivious to how odd that looked beside his bloodstained hair, he then rooted through the pack right to the bottom, drawing out something so small that his hand completely engulfed it.

"What's that?" Daine asked, craning her neck curiously. He flashed a smile at her, and she relaxed. Whatever frantic thought had possessed him had clearly quietened a little. When he returned to the fire and sat down she looped one arm around his waist and rested her head against his shoulder. Numair glanced at her, turning the cloth-wrapped object over and over in his fingers. She watched it, feeling rather sleepy as it gently turned in the warm light, and the man smiled and touched her hair when she smothered a yawn.

"Are you tired, sweetling? If you're too sleepy to argue back then this might be a better time to ask you than I hoped."

"Me? You're the one who should be nodding off..." She smothered another yawn and then shrugged ruefully and gestured at the thing he was fiddling with. "I think I can guess what that is."

"Mm." He looked down at the velvet bag. "You probably do. And I probably know what your secret is, too."

"Prob'ly." She cut her eyes up at him, a little flustered. "But neither of us properly knows how to say it."

"Exactly." He wrapped his arm around her waist and drew her closer, ignoring the pain in his ribs to draw her into his lap and hold her tightly. Daine immediately wrapped her arms around his shoulders, coaxing him closer until she could kiss the end of his nose.

"You've had more practice with your question," she whispered, confidingly. "I think you should go first."

"That's not fair! I should be wide awake, with more blood in my veins and less in my hair, and more than half an hour away from an argument with you. I need to be calm and collected and... and clean. And I think it's quite unfair of you to refer to my earlier attempts as _practice._ You go first."

"But all that proper calm-and-collected stuff was how you asked me the last few times, and I said no. Remember?"

"I would hardly forget." He muttered, and pulled a face at her. "You refused a lot. Maybe you would rather marry someone who had the sense not to get ambushed."

"No-one like that has ever asked me." Daine raised her eyebrows at him. "Do you think they might? Because if that sulky speech is how you're wording your proposal, Numair, I might change my mind about being hopelessly in love with you."

He winced and was silent for a long time, holding her closely and clearly thinking very deeply. His voice came out in a low, thoughtful hum. "I'll stop teasing you, love. You hate my poetry, too, so how should I ask?"

He looked around then, meeting her eyes with clear honesty and not smiling, but searching her own grey eyes for something. "I suppose the most important thing... the only thing that matters, Daine... is to tell you how much I love you. And I truly do. All romance and comradeship and even the sex notwithstanding, I want to spend the rest of my life with you. You've always known that, and I hope you believe it even when I'm saying stupid things. Which I will try to do less, I promise."

"Are you bargaining with me?" She whispered with a smile.

"Is it working?"

"It's not needful." Daine stroked his cheek. "I was planning to say yes eventually."

"But... today?" He tried not to look hopeful, but she felt his heart pounding.

She hesitated, "On one condition."

"Only one!" Numair laughed and kissed the end of her nose, biting back his delight when she pulled a face at him and moved back. "What is it, love?"

"Well, I need you to… to believe something. Because if you don't I won't feel right, but I know how you get so twisted up in your thoughts sometimes, and once they're in there I have a hag of a time untwisting them, you know. So I don't want to spend the rest of my life doing that, thank you very much. That's my condition."

"What do you need me to believe? I'd agree, but I should probably know what I'm actually agreeing to." He met her eyes seriously, and Daine tried to focus on that, or on the strong arm that circled her back: the real things that always made her feel safe. It was still difficult to find the words, but this time she managed.

"That… that my saying yes has nothing to do with… with… with anything apart from the fact that you're right, and we should spend the rest of our lives together, and love each other, and be each other's family, and… and everything else. I'm saying yes because of that, not because of anything else. You need to believe me when I say that now, because I know that everyone else is going to be saying something else, and I don't want you to believe them over me."

"Of course I'll believe you. I wouldn't dare argue with such inarticulacy." He said drily, and then grinned and kissed her to prove that he was teasing. Daine smiled shakily and kissed him back, careful not to lean into his embrace as much as she wanted to because she knew he must be in pain.

"So the answer's yes?" He demanded almost as soon as they broke apart. The girl raised an eyebrow.

"When did you actually ask me the ques…?"

"Veralidaine Sarrasri, will you marry me?"

"Yes," she smiled irresistibly at the simple word, because saying it had made a thrill dance through her entire body. "Seems like too short of an answer, doesn't it?"

"No, it's the _right_ answer, at long last!" He nearly shouted it, and Daine laughed and pressed her finger to his lips, shushing him about as effectively as a sparrow could stop a hurricane. The people fair across the keep could probably hear them, she thought happily, what with all the laughter and the jubilant words, the strange lulls when they couldn't help kissing each other, and the rising laughter again each time either of them said anything at all. It took a long time for either of them to relax enough to be sensible. Numair started it, pressing a hand to his ribs in sudden pain and then idiotically trying to pretend he hadn't done it. His new fiancée rolled her eyes at him and forced him to sit down, building up the embers of the long-ignored fire while he caught his breath.

"Did I mention I was once engaged to a dolt who danced around with broken ribs?" She muttered to him, annoyed at both of them for forgetting. He waved an easily dismissive hand.

"Daine, what are the gossips going to say that I shouldn't believe?" He asked, and from the careful tone of his voice Daine knew he already knew her answer. Perhaps that was why she felt flustered.

"They're going to say I married you because I'm… I'm pregnant, Numair." She couldn't stop smiling suddenly, "Numair, I'm pregnant! My charm broke off and I didn't notice and ma told me this morning and… and we're going to have a _baby_ , Numair!"

He held out a hand to her, and when she took it he pulled her down and kissed her. It was utterly unlike the way they had been embracing each other a few minutes before. Where those had been excited and happy, quick fleeting kisses given with light hearts, this was slow and infinitely tender. Daine sighed and sank to her knees, feeling utterly lost in this sudden softness.

"Daine," he murmured, and his eyes seemed over-bright in the warm light. "I don't think I'll ever stop being amazed by you."

"It was an accident," she started, embarrassed by the depth of expression in his eyes. He smiled and shook his head and kissed her again.

"I love accidents. It was an accident that you found me in the marsh, and that we lived so close together those first few years… and that we got dragged into the Divine Realms and that we fell in love… I can happily live with as many accidents as the gods throw at us, sweetling." He kissed her forehead tenderly. "And I love this accident in particular."

"Me too," she confided, and then hid a smile. "I hope my da heard you say that. He thought you'd run a mile."

"Run? After the day I've had? I might manage a crawl," he looked up at the ceiling, as if he would see Weiryn glowering down at him from the dusty rafters, and then he shrugged. "I don't believe it, Daine. Even your father can't possibly think that poorly of me."

"He doesn't know the real you, any better than the people in this keep." Daine quipped, and then added more slowly: "We'll have to do something about that, you know, before we get married."

"And when is that, ma'am?" He teased her, but the girl looked back at him quite seriously.

"We want the baby to have our name, don't we? So… before it's born. That means we have less than six months. That's if we made the baby at Fort Amapt, because if it was that time we hid in the dovecote near the border then it's more like five…"

"Let's say it's Amapt," Numair offered, with a slight wince, "Just in case the baby ever asks."

"It wasn't that bad," Daine grinned at him. "The baby won't care that we got seen."

"I care. I say it was when we actually had a bed."

"Well, for your dignity's sake let's hope you're right." She remarked, and then added more seriously: "We need to get married on a solstice."

"Under the quietly judgemental eyes of your father?" Numair wasn't quite serious, but he was far from joking, and the girl sighed.

"Please, Numair. Be the bigger man."

"Against an eight foot tall god?" He returned her sigh. "I'll try."


	5. The Third Solstice: Part 1

"I am not," Numair said in a thunderous voice, "going to ask that man's permission to do _anything."_

Lindhall looked levelly at his old student, a technique which usually worked. Today, it didn't. Numair could quite easily be distracted from ranting about his homework, research, practice timetables or major acts of treason, but it seemed he was quite adamant on the topic of his in-laws.

"Didn't you tell me he saved your life?" The man asked instead, risking a peep over his casually steepled fingers at the red-faced man. Numair looked irritated at the reminder, and tugged on his nose so hard it might have come loose on a lesser man.

"He didn't do anything for me. He would have saved any one of his daughter's pets with the same amount of... of empathy. In return he got to feel all superior and smug about his parenting, like it somehow made up for all the years he spent ignoring her. And even then he made her beg. Beg! His own child." Numair scowled and picked up a poker to viciously prod at the embers.

"Don't do that." Lindhall interrupted, "It's already too hot in here."

"I won't ask his permission to marry the woman I love, and I won't ask your permission to stoke my own dratted fire." Numair gave it another heartfelt stab and then flinched away from a sudden flare of heat, his stubbornly set jaw beginning to redden.

"That's a fantastic way to live." The other man drawled sardonically, "Don't think I'm about to smooth salve on your burned flesh when you end up alone." He flicked his fingers out at the fire and mouthed a silent word. The flames flickered out as if they had been a candle flame, extinguished by the wind. The other mage sat back and folded his arms, looking a little defeated.

"It wouldn't come to that. I just..." He prodded a piece of wood with his toe, listening to it whine as it rapidly cooled down. "I can't convince myself that Weiryn has any right to... to keep her in the first place. So why should I ask for his consent, now? Daine agreed to marry me, and she's the only person whose opinion matters. She should make that decision. No-one else has the right to make it for her."

"Or influence her towards it?" Lindhall said, a little pointedly. When Numair reddened the man raised a reproving finger. "Ah! I'm not accusing you. I'm just suggesting that you consider the entire context, not simply your own opinion."

"I'm sure Weiryn would say something similar," Numair answered snidely, "But he would only be saying it to be cruel. If you really think that I somehow contrived to make Daine pregnant to make her agree, then you can leave my rooms right now."

"I'm your best man." Lindhall shrugged. "If you throw me out, your wedding rings walk out with me."

"No rings, no permission... but at least we still have our honeymoon planned." Numair sighed with a sudden glimmer of humour. "I think I'll just find Daine and escape with her a day early. Daine probably wouldn't mind so much about missing the wedding, and we'd be miles away from this debacle before anyone missed us."

"You're being an ass." The other man heaved himself to his feet and rested a hand on Numair's shoulder. "You have pre-wedding jitters, my friend. Perfectly reasonable stress exacerbated, in your case, by the fact that until the solstice begins you can't even speak to your future father-in-law. There's a lot resting on tomorrow, isn't there?"

"Only the rest of our lives," Numair said dourly.

888

"Aren't you finished yet?" Daine demanded, planting her hands on her hips. Thayet scowled and yanked her hands away, forcing the young woman to stand up straight.

"If you would just stop fidgeting..." She tried, and then huffed a sigh and gave up. The dressmaker gave her a panicked look, and desperately planted as many pins into the skirt as she could before Daine moved again. Her hasty fingers were a little too eager, and Daine jumped and cursed loudly.

"I'm not a pincushion!"

"You're not helping!" Thayet snapped, almost tripping over a cat as it streamed past her legs. "We would have finished hours ago if you would just..."

"Ugh! Fine!" Daine shut her eyes and closed her hands into fists at her sides. As one, the swarm of animals in the room all sat perfectly still, listening, and then slunk into a cool corner to glare balefully at the queen. The wildmage opened her eyes and matched her animals' expression. "There. Better?"

"Aren't you excited?" The dressmaker asked timidly, inserting a few more careful pins into the fragile fabric. Daine opened her mouth to make some snapped retort, and then flushed and covered her flaring cheeks with her hands. This time Thayet didn't scold her, but the girl almost wished that she would. It would give her an excuse to feel so fractious when... shouldn't she be thanking them for all their help? But the words spilled up in her mouth without her really wanting them, and she found herself speaking aloud.

"I just want it to be over." She couldn't meet Thayet's eyes, but she could feel the woman's expression. Shocked, horrified, hurt... how did she look? Daine didn't dare peek. "I know why you're throwing such a grand banquet, and I know we agreed to it, but now it's here I just wish it was all done with."

Thayet was silent, and Daine gulped back something that was too close to an apology to taste as bitter as it did. It felt good to have finally told the truth to someone else. She and Numair had spent several evenings whispering about it to each other, as if they could be overheard even in the privacy of their own rooms, but they hadn't dared to say a single word of it out loud.

They had announced their plans to marry just as the war had reached a critical point. The killing machines had betrayed a weakness, and their creator-mage had been rooted out of his den like the child-killing rat he was.

Tortall reeled from the stories, and even as the fighting ended a darkened sky seemed to loom over the country. They could not celebrate their victory, not really. When a war between noble knights ended, the winner could boast in their superior skills and their national pride. But this war had been depraved, fought between children and innocents, with thousands of refugees left homeless and starving on the borders. There was no nobility in this war; there could be no victory.

The Tortallan people shared their homes with the bedraggled survivors, and tried not to imagine the men and women with swords forced into their emaciated hands, or the children crumpled up in twisted metal, their limp limbs rotting like carrion.

Like many of their comrades, Daine and Numair had returned to the capitol city with aimless steps, not quite knowing what they should do. The king sent many of his knights back to the borders to oversee the Scanran surrender and escort the refugees to safety, but it was simple work. Besides, on the one occasion when he had thought to send them away, he took one look at Daine and shook his head.

"I'm sorry," He told her, rubbing his eyes tiredly. "I know you want to be useful, but I can't in good conscience..."

"There must be something I can do." She insisted, self-consciously folding her arms over her swelling stomach. "Please, Jon."

He sighed and glanced at Numair for support. The man shook his head and very pointedly gestured to Daine. "Ask her, not me." He said softly. "Daine knows what she's capable of."

It was an odd statement, and one which Jon had heard from many a henpecked husband in his time. But coming from Numair it sounded different, as if he genuinely believed it and had thought it over himself, not been told it. As protective as the man was, you would have thought...

... but then, Jon realised, Numair couldn't possibly become _more_ protective of Daine; he had defended her since she was thirteen. And Daine was just as fierce, in her own way. Their child, whether it was born in a castle or a warzone, was probably going to be the most cosseted, safest infant in the mortal realms. Jon could almost envy the poor little thing.

"I'm sorry," He said, "I lost my train of thought. I was just thinking... when are you getting married?"

"At the solstice." They exchanged a smile, but looked a little puzzled as Daine kept explaining: "So my parents can be there."

"That's quite soon," Jon said, slowly coming up with an idea. Thayet would yell at him for the extra work, but if they could manage it, then... "Numair, Daine, I have a proposal for you."

It was quite simple, on the face of it. The people of Tortall needed something to mark the end of the war. A triumph would feel vulgar, and a national holiday would ostracise the Scanran immigrants who were trying to carve out a new life in this new country. He couldn't very well share out the spoils of war, and a procession through the cities would take up time he desperately needed to use rebuilding. But another celebration... a wedding...

"You can't be serious." Daine looked appalled. Numair mirrored her.

"We wanted something simple!"

"I don't mean the actual ceremony," Jon quickly amended, although he had. Improvising on the fly, he added: "The solstice is three days long, so you can have one day which is your actual wedding, and see your parents, Daine, and...and translate the rite into those dragon whistles or whatever it is that you were planning to do..."

"Kit understands Common just fine." Daine muttered, looking more mulish now her shock had faded. Jon waved a hand rapidly.

"But on one of the other days, we'll announce to the whole kingdom that you... that the people they've heard songs about in the taverns... that you're getting married, and that you want them all to share in your happiness..."

"Can they share in our happiness once we're safely hidden in Galla?" Daine looked hopeful, and then sighed when Jon shook his head. "Look, I know what you're trying to do, but... but surely...?"

"The people need something to make them feel normal again." Numair said, his voice thoughtful. "What's more normal... more natural... than a wedding?"

"You think it's a good idea?" Daine asked, looking up at him. Jon was irked to see that, for the first time, she seemed to be taking the idea seriously. When he had suggested it she had barely given it a moment's thought before arguing back. Numair's absentminded words had softened her stubborn mind like a candle flame to wax.

Jon looked expectantly at Numair, waiting for him to nod, and instead was treated to an apologetic frown. "We'll have to talk this over, Jon. You can't possibly want an answer now."

"Why not?" The king asked, before really considering the propriety of those words. A few hours later, when she heard the whole story, Thayet sat him down and very sternly pointed out exactly why and how he was an idiot.

In the meantime, though, the scornful expression on both the mages' faces said enough.

In the end they had agreed, although they never exactly explained why. They didn't really talk about it at all. Instead, they let the servants run around arranging a banquet and a cake and decorations for the hall and the town square, and quietly planned their own day in the small moments of peace left to them. It kept them busy, which was one blessing, although the closer they got to the solstice, the more closed-off they became.

Daine, snapping at Thayet in her last dress fitting before the whole fiasco, had a headache so vicious she could hear it thudding in her ears.

"I understand," The queen said, breaking through the silence with her bell-like voice. "I felt the same when I married Jon."

The girl gaped at her. "You did? But you're a queen!"

"So?"

"Well, your whole life you... when you were a child, you must have known that... but I never thought that..."

"I suppose that's true," Thayet mused, absentmindedly gathering up the girl's curls to check the line of lace around her neck. "But I wasn't marrying a prince, I was marrying Jonathan. I was engaged to a tall, handsome man who was adorably awkward around me whenever I smiled, and who looked desperately guilty whenever I looked sad. I was going to make my vows to someone who I fell in love with in one night, when we stayed awake and told each other stories until we ran out of firewood. I met him in my nightgown, did I ever tell you that? And when Alanna introduced us to each other I was frightened that he would fall over his own feet, his bow was so clumsy!

"I knew then that I liked him, by the morning I knew that I would love him, and by the night before our wedding I wanted to hate him. I had all these people telling me I was marrying the king, and that I must be perfect, and that I would be a good queen. Not that we would share a life together or have beautiful children, or that our personalities matched. We would look good on a shared portrait, and wear matching crowns, and that was all I heard from dawn until dusk."

Daine was staring at her, and her deep blush had faded to a look of empathy. For the first time, someone else seemed to understand how she felt. She lowered her hands to her sides and stood perfectly still, barely noticing the seamstress who took full advantage of the girl's distraction.

"Why didn't you run away?" She asked, in an unsteady voice. "I want to run and run until no-one can find me."

Thayet stood and kissed her cheek. "I hated marrying the king, but marrying my Jonathan was the most wonderful moment of my life. The moment I stepped into the temple and our eyes met, the world just faded away."


	6. The Third Solstice: Part 2

"What a load of nonsense." Weiryn sniffed, scratching irritably at his shoulder. Everything annoyed him. The flags in the street were too bright, the people were too many and too close, and smell of hot street food was rank and cloying in the air. There was also a distinctively bawdy note to the songs he could hear trickling out of the taverns they walked past, even though it was barely morning. Even Sarra had balked at the last observation, when her husband cooly pointed out that her daughter's name was quite clearly being rhymed with...

"They said they had nothing to do with this." She muttered, but something about her face seemed a little fierce as she added to herself, "Daine told me that. _She_ wouldn't lie to me."

Weiryn snorted and shook his head. The hood of the cloak snagged on one of his horns, and he reached up long fingers to yank it free. "I hate cloaks." He said sulkily. "They're hot."

"At least you'll have something in common with your son-in-law."

The god looked suspiciously out from under the itchy fabric and then lowered his hands from his head. "Actually, it's not so bad. I much prefer this to being pestered by mortals."

Sarra hid a smile and didn't answer. If she had been a more vindictive woman, she might have pointed out that it would have taken her husband a few seconds to cast a glamour on himself. But she knew that Weiryn had set himself up to face the day as himself, or not at all. He strode towards his goal with all the stubborn pride of a king stag. Anything less would be an insult to his daughter, and to his family, and to the beasts whose nature he shared.

Actually, that was half of the problem. Weiryn was still the stag – the dominant male, overseeing his herd with violent protectiveness. Threats, weaknesses, should be chased away. But how could he drive this new male from his herd? Daine had chosen her path, and Weiryn had to surrender, for the first time in his life, and make way for a weaker male. A _mortal!_

Sarra couldn't work out if the god was more twitchy about that detail or out of normal, fatherly concern for his little girl.

Instead of disguising himself as a human, the god wrapped himself in a woollen cloak and stalked through the streets of the city radiating irritation and excitement and idiocy. Out of love and the primal force of ages, he was both intimidating and ridiculous.

The goddess had told Daine to warn Numair, but she had no idea if her words had sunk in. The few brief messages they had exchanged had been so full of other worries and joys that Sarra hadn't had the heart to complicate things further. She was a little surprised, then, when Daine sent another message early in the morning of the solstice, asking if she could change their meeting place.

There had been no time to reply; when they crossed the realms, the two gods made their way through the crowded streets to the cooler, dark passageways that lay in the lee of the castle. Trapped between the castle walls and the town defences, these streets were more like alleyways. Other cities would have fallen to crime to fill these passageways, but the Rogue were so respected in the capital that most of the citizens knew that, even in dark alleyways, they must mind their manners. There was a code for everything, even crime, and in the aftermath of the war the watchful eyes of the Rogue were as necessary as the more legitimate gaze of the palace guard.

The inn Daine had chosen as a meeting place was quiet, almost deserted, and when Weiryn ducked through the doorway the ringing bell sounded dull and rusty. He sniffed the stale air, harrumphed, and then stalked inside. Sarra was about to follow when she felt a hand on her arm.

"Daine!" She cried, turning to see her daughter. The girl winced and immediately pressed her finger to her lips, gesturing with her eyes to the closed tavern door. Sarra blinked and then understood. Fighting back the urge to laugh, she followed her daughter back into the sunlight and gave her a hug.

"You two planned to ambush him?" She asked, her eyes creasing with unshed giggles. Daine rolled her eyes.

"I planned to ambush both of them." The girl shot a glare back in the direction of the tavern. "We'll need to stay close by, ma. I told Numair that if I see him diving out of the window I'll send every rat from the sewers to chase after him."

"It's bad luck for him to even see you before the wedding," The woman said idly. "I don't know what unleashing a plague foretells."

"It means we'll actually get married. I said I would refuse him at the altar else." Daine folded her arms and then plopped down into the dust, leaning back against the stone wall so she could keep watching the inn. A bitter note crept into her voice, and she added, "I had to threaten him with that. I had to _mean_ it."

Sarra sighed and planted a kiss on her daughter's head before sitting down beside her. For a long time they didn't say a word, but listened to the distant sounds of music and celebration. Every so often someone would walk past, and more often than not they were dressed in festive clothes. In the distance they could hear the shrieks of children watching tumblers in the fair, and the occasional hoofing sounds of the fire eaters spewing molten flames into the air.

"Isn't it silly?" Daine said, eventually taking her eyes off the building. Sarra didn't answer, and Daine knew that her mother was being diplomatic. Smiling slightly, she nodded in the direction of the festivities. "It doesn't have anything to do with us, they just needed an excuse. For every hundred people out there I don't think one of them could pick me out of a crowd. Numair, maybe... he's a little more memorable than I am." She smiled and there was a warmer note in her voice when she said his name.

"It doesn't mean anything to them that today we're separate and tomorrow we'll be married. It doesn't mean a thing to anyone singing our names out there. It makes me glad, really. If I think about how little we mean to them, it makes me understand how much more we mean to each other. How it means everything for us, and... and how we want to share that. All this foolishness is just..." She waved a hand idly, "Just... noise."

Sarra wrapped her arm around Daine's shoulders and held her tightly, feeling that she was trembling. She belatedly realised that her daughter must have seen Weiryn's set face, been listening out for their arrival and even heard his comments about the bar singers. The god had been offended on his own behalf; Sarra knew for a fact that Daine wouldn't have cared a jot what those people thought of her, except for the fact that it was making her da angry. Any cracks in the poor girl's tentative, careful love for her newfound father would hurt her like shattering shards.

"I'm sure your Da will respect your choice, Daine."

"Will he admit it, though?" A flash of humour crossed the girl's face. "Seems risky, to me! A god meddling in the affairs of us lowly mortals?"

"He's done that before," Sarra pulled a meaningful face at her, and then grinned at Daine's blushing giggle as she understood what her mother meant. "Just because he's never been mortal, doesn't mean he doesn't know how to love."

"He doesn't love Numair," Daine pointed out, somewhat redundantly.

"Maybe not, but he knows how much you do. And your Da loves you with all his heart, Daine." Sarra drew a deep breath and glanced at the tavern door. She desperately hoped that she was right. "He wants you to be happy."

"What did he say to you?" Daine asked, and then when she didn't get an answer she pushed herself between her fiancé and the bookshelf and asked again: "What did you say to him?"

Numair looked down at her and smiled distractedly. "Shouldn't you be getting changed, Daine?"

"Oh, bother getting changed. You haven't said one word about it since we came back from town!"

"And nor will I, Miss Sarrasri." He looked rather stern. "Until you fulfil your end of the bargain."

She caught her breath and then shut her mouth with an audible snap. Her fierce blush clashed with her sullen, unapologetic mutter. "I did. I didn't send the rats after you."

He caught her elbow, waiting for Daine to calm down a little before he spoke. When he touched her hand he realised that her fingers were icy, and that she was shaking a little.

Numair felt guilty, then. He carefully put his book back into its place on the shelf and led her away from the wall, thinking carefully as they made their way to the cooler window alcove.

He hadn't meant to upset Daine, but when he left the inn he knew that his own thoughts were racing far too fast for him to think of any coherent words. His head was swimming when he stepped back into his sunshine. Weiryn, the cur, had darted away to fulfil his solstice duties before his family could even see his expression, so of course Numair made a special effort to smile and tell the women that everything was fine. Fine, that was what he said. He even nodded and made a friendly gesture towards the musky dust that the vanishing god had left in his wake. Yes, all fine.

But, naturally, Daine couldn't rest easily with such an ambiguous answer. She had held her tongue when they walked back into town, and made increasingly pointed eyes at him as they ate their breakfast, and Numair still couldn't think of any words which would make any sense. He voluntarily washed up the plates (which made her even more suspicious, but allowed him a few more precious seconds to think) and then tried to hide in his study.

This was not a good strategy. Of all the hiding places in their shared rooms, Numair had a grand total of... one. Daine would shrug and leave him to his books if she knew he needed to be alone, but if she was determined to find him it was less a matter of searching and more a matter of listening out for the sounds of rustling pages.

Gods, they were supposed to be getting married in a few hours, and she looked so feverish with curiosity and worry that people would probably think she was having second thoughts!

"Sweetling." He kissed her cheek first, and then her other cheek, and then the end of her nose for good measure. "Please don't look so scared. I wouldn't lie to you about something so important."

"You've got your thinking face on." She whispered tartly, "And it's making me fair suspicious."

"I'm not thinking about your father." This was a lie. Numair knew she could see through it even before she rolled her eyes. He changed tactic: "I'll tell you everything he said after the solstice, I promise."

"After we're married." Daine said flatly. He nodded and she drew a deep breath, almost hurting his wrist when her anxious fingers dug into the skin. "Did my father make you promise something? Some condition? Some... some escape clause?"

"No!" He laughed, and it broke the tension a little. "Nothing like that, Daine. We just talked. I didn't have to barter with him or anything so... crass." She still looked cynical, and so he added, "Do you really think your father would treat you like a trading token?"

Daine laughed and shook her head. "I guess not. I just can't imagine what..." relenting, she shook her head and smiled ruefully. "Gods. My head's in a mess. This feels like a long day already, and we've not even started."

Numair turned her hand over and traced the softness of her palm with his thumb. For a few moments they stood like that in silence, barely touching, a few hours away from everything being over. Daine was right, though. It had barely begun.

"Ma said it was bad luck for you to see me before our wedding." The girl said softly. Her eyes darted up – challenging but amused – and then a strange shadow crossed over their grey light. "It was the first time I thought... that it's actually happening today. Not the nonsense and silly lace dresses but us being properly married. I guess I'm about as scared thinking on that than whatever you and da talked about."

Numair's racing mind nodded vehemently and tried to coax him back into the comparative safety of a book or two. Squashing the impulse to shiver, the man put his awareness into his fingertips, into the very solid and real world that would still be there, and frightening, however many books he read. The thought made him smile, and he told Daine, "I remember you telling me once... after one of the many times that you said 'no'... that we were basically already married. You asked me what else I could possibly want – since we already lived together, and slept in the same bed, and loved each other and 'all that'..." He mimicked her accent with a pained expression, and was relieved when Daine giggled.

"I said I wanted you to be my wife. Oh, words!, you declared. All of it is just words. Of course they mean something to a bookworm like Master Salmalin, but as for you!... you knew they were just words."

"Clearly I don't think that now," She pointed out, looking slightly pink, "Or else I wouldn't have said yes."

He gestured to the bookshelves behind her. "Most things are just words in the end. If there's anything more substantial to worry about, then we can probably muddle through it together. I'm scared... honestly, sweetling, I'm terrified. I know I'm going to mess so many things up, and make so many mistakes. I hate knowing that. But... but somehow I'm not scared of getting things wrong alongside you. I don't know why. Maybe it's because you're so practical, or because you've already seen me at my worst, or because I love you so much it would tear me apart to do anything without you in my life, even making mistakes. But whenever the rest of our lives starts to sound imposing I try to remind myself of that. It's not romantic or sentimental but..."

His voice trailed off and he realised his throat was choked up. He'd been speaking in a hoarse whisper, and he hadn't even noticed. Daine was staring at him with wide eyes, her mouth gaping open a little in surprise. It was an utterly graceless expression which suited Numair's mood so perfectly that he wanted to laugh. But he couldn't. The mirth bubbled up in his chest and by the time it reached his throat it felt more like tears. He swallowed and covered his face with one hand.

"You're scared, too." Daine reached up to pull his hand away and stood on tiptoes so she could press her cheek to his. "You didn't tell me."

"I told your father." Numair heard the wonder in his own voice, and when Daine looked up at him in shock he caught her up in his arms and held her tightly. There were so many other things he could tell her, but the laughter rose in his voice then, as welcome and sweet as rain falling after a drought. He had to smother the sound, but he couldn't stop his hysterical laughter "It's the first time I've ever seen him smile."


End file.
